Tag Archives: history

Politics is killing us

Best case scenario — “Green renewal and democratic repair”

The Labour leadership crisis is resolved relatively quickly after a change in direction rather than descending into factional warfare, like we saw with the Tory party. Andy Burnham or a similar figure successfully reframes politics around competence, fairness, infrastructure and hope rather than managerial decline.
Labour forms a broader coalition inside the party with stronger voices on climate, welfare, housing, democratic reform, industrial and economic strategy, immigration and public services.
Investment in renewables, grid upgrades, home insulation, battery storage, public transport and emerging technologies accelerates. Planning reform and grid connection reform finally unblock stalled projects – without compromising nature protections.
Electricity prices fall as the UK becomes less dependent on volatile international gas prices. Energy security improves through domestic renewable generation rather than new fossil fuel dependency.
National infrastructure projects begin to show visible benefits – warmer homes, better rail and bus links, cleaner rivers, new jobs in retrofit and energy, more resilient local economies.
The NHS stabilises through workforce investment, prevention, social care reform and better pay/conditions, reducing burnout and waiting lists.
A more honest public conversation develops around immigration – explaining demographic pressures, NHS staffing needs, agriculture, care work, universities and the economic contribution of migrants. Dehumanising rhetoric loses traction.
Public education, media literacy and local community investment help reduce support for far-right politics and conspiracy movements.
Protest rights are partially restored. Some authoritarian legislation from recent years is rolled back. Peaceful protest and civil liberties are treated as democratic necessities rather than threats and charges are dropped against the 1000’s currently facing prosecution under anti-terrorism laws for holding cardboard placards.
The UK adopts a more balanced and lawful international stance, including stronger pressure for ceasefires, adherence to international law and reduced political tolerance for war crimes or collective punishment. Yes, I’m referring to Israel mostly, but also in Sudan, China, Iran, Venezuela, and other parts of the world.
New North Sea oil and gas expansion remains cancelled as renewables become economically dominant, and the UK becomes energy independent.
Super El-Nino hits with devastating consequences.
Farming policy shifts toward resilience – soil restoration, flood mitigation, regenerative agriculture, food security and partial dietary transition toward lower-emission food systems – plant based diet.
AI and data-centre expansion are regulated and taxed effectively enough that some of the economic gains are recycled into public services, training and eventually forms of income support as automation increases. This could include a Universal Basic Income – we have to tax data centres as income tax revenue falls, due to job losses to AI.
The Green Party of England and Wales continues making gains in local government and Parliament, helping keep climate and nature breakdown politically unavoidable even if not in government.
Media reform begins to address ownership concentration, misinformation, transparency and platform accountability are addressed more seriously – see the Media Sovereignty Act.
Despite worsening climate impacts globally, the UK becomes somewhat more resilient through adaptation planning, flood defence, insulation, energy security and social cohesion.

If Labour could manage that, I’d be both amazed and amazingly grateful.

Median case scenario — “Managed decline with partial progress”

Labour remains in power or remains the largest poltiical force, but internal divisions and fear of media backlash limit ambition – what we have now.
Some green infrastructure succeeds – especially renewables and grid investment (NSIPs) – but projects are slowed by planning disputes, local opposition (NIMBYs), underinvestment and institutional inertia.
Electricity becomes somewhat cleaner, but bills remain high because housing inefficiency, the link to gas prices and infrastructure costs are not fully addressed.
NHS pressures ease slightly in some areas but remain severe overall due to ageing demographics, staff shortages and chronic underfunding.
Climate policy survives but is inconsistent – progress on renewable power exists alongside airport expansion (on the agenda again), road building and continued support for some fossil fuel extraction. Global emissions continue rising.
AI expansion and automation increase inequality faster than political systems adapt to it. Productivity gains mostly flow upward into large corporations and asset owners.
Immigration remains a toxic political issue. Neither side fully wins the argument. Public frustration continues to be channelled toward migrants rather than structural economic problems.
Reform UK and other populist-right forces continue growing but do not fully take power. Their rhetoric shifts mainstream politics further right on migration, protest and culture-war issues.
Protest rights remain restricted compared to previous decades, though not completely dismantled.
Media sensationalism, billionaire influence and algorithm-driven outrage continue dominating public discourse. Trust in institutions remains low.
Climate impacts worsen globally: crop failures, migration pressures, insurance instability and extreme weather increasingly affect everyday life and public finances. Super El-Nino hits with devastating consequences.
The public becomes more politically cynical and emotionally exhausted rather than mobilised – stagnation.
Living standards stagnate for many people, but outright collapse is avoided through continued state borrowing, technological adaptation and institutional resilience.
The Greens continue gradual growth but remain structurally constrained by the electoral system – proportional representation neeeded.

Side note on data centres and AI: Politicians are failing to keep up with the pace of AI advancement, and the need for data centres to provide a viable economic model – if we don’t want to reject that model completely. In order to be competitive and fund the standards of living, welfare, healthcare, and even military resources we’re used to, then we have to move very quickly, increasing electricity production massively and quickly – which nuclear can’t do but renewables could – as well as the number of UK data centres. The alternative, which actually might be healthier and happier but fraught with peril, is to regress, become far more subsistence based, with communities really supporting one another but without luxuries, holidays and many of the privileges we’ve become used to – maybe that would be a good thing, given we have had our fair share of the carbon budget.

Worst case scenario — “Authoritarian fossil-fuel populism”

Labour fractures after electoral defeats, leadership crises or economic shocks. Progressive politics becomes divided and demoralised.
Reform UK or a broader right-populist coalition wins power during a period of economic stress, migration panic and institutional distrust – this could happen quite quickly.
Net zero policies are heavily weakened or more likely abandoned. New North Sea oil and gas extraction expands while renewable deployment slows through planning obstruction and political hostility.
Energy prices remain volatile due to continued fossil fuel dependence and international instability. More people die from the cold.
Protest laws become significantly harsher. Direct action, climate protest and some forms of dissent are increasingly criminalised or surveilled. More prisons and detention camps are built.
Public broadcasters and regulators face increasing political pressure. Media ecosystems become even more dominated by outrage, disinformation and billionaire influence.
Migrants, refugees, Muslims, LGBTQ+ people and other minorities become central political scapegoats. Hate crimes and political intimidation increase.
Democratic norms erode, but won’t collapse overnight – attacks on courts, civil society, universities, journalists and human rights frameworks become normalised. This is what happened in the 1930s.
Economic inequality worsens sharply. Public services including the NHS deteriorate further through privatisation and austerity-style policies.
AI-driven job losses accelerate without meaningful redistribution, retraining or welfare reform, fuelling anger and instability.
Climate impacts intensify globally while adaptation remains inadequate – flooding, food inflation, insurance withdrawal, water stress and migration pressures become increasingly destabilising.
International instability increases through resource conflicts, wars and geopolitical fragmentation – it’s happening now.
More extreme far-right movements emerge claiming even right-populist governments are “too weak”, driving a further cycle of radicalisation and authoritarianism.
Civil unrest becomes increasingly common – riots, political violence, strikes and heavy-handed policing become part of normal political life.
Institutional trust collapses further as large parts of the public conclude the political system no longer works for them.
Local resistance movements, trade unions, community groups, environmental organisations and some councils continue resisting and building alternative structures of solidarity and resilience – we will not be silenced, and we will not give in to fascism and hate.
Super El-Nino hits with devastating consequences.

Did you spot the bullet point that happens in all the scenarios. It’s my example, and in the case of Super El-Nino probably inevitable, of the impacts of climate breakdown that will happen whatever we do, like sea level rise and coastal cities eventually being swamped.

These scenarios can sound pretty bleak, but the latter has too high a probability for my liking, on our current trajectory. Personally, I have lost faith in our political system, despite being a district councillor and member of the Green Party. Even in the Green Party I’ve seen the desperation to win votes mean people don’t do what is right, and that appears to be getting worse as we get bigger. I will continue to work to the best of my ability within the system, for the moment, but truly believe we need Citizens’ Assemblies to get us out of the mess we’re in.

I do not want a future built on authoritarianism, scapegoating and fear. I want one built on participation, compassion, truth and shared responsibility.

We need to rebuild democracy itself to give long term resilience, community, wellbeing and equality.

We can’t afford to give up, see you on the streets ✊

Useful links:

Take Back Power: https://takebackpower.net/
Draw a Smile – helping kids in Gaza: https://www.gofundme.com/f/7nryrd-draw-a-smile
Carbon Reckoning campaign on emissions: https://www.crowdjustice.com/case/carbon-reckoning/
Defend our Juries: https://defendourjuries.net/
Media Sovereignty Act: https://mediasovereignty.org/petition/

And here is a picture of my cat, being judgemental, because he wanted to be involved and frankly is better at governance than me.

Rage Is a Rational Response

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It’s February, and I’m still consumed by rage – with a generous side-order of despair – at our direction of travel. Are we really this stupid? Are we genuinely going to let a tiny proportion of the world’s population completely screw the rest of us over?

Last week I wrote about the government report on the risks of ecosystem collapse to national security. The report was finally released in January, but accusations abound, including from The Times, that this is not the full version. Some of the most worrying conclusions, particularly around food supply chains and geopolitical instability, appear to have been quietly redacted. Hardly in the public interest. And, as mentioned last week, all very Don’t Look Up.

I also wrote a letter to several regional newspapers on the subject, which was published today in the heady heights of the Sunderland Echo.

It’s also appeared in the Eastern Daily Press, Derby Telegraph, Leicester Mercury, and a few others – and, unlike the government report, it hasn’t been redacted. For some reason the Daily Mail hasn’t picked it up yet, but I’m sure it’s only a matter of time.

Our excessive lifestyles are driving global heating. Greenhouse gas emissions are still rising, and the climate and nature crises are accelerating, catalysed by feedback loops that are pushing us over, towards – or dangerously close to – irreversible tipping points. When I say “our excessive lifestyles”, I mostly mean the richest 1% of the global population, who are responsible for a grotesquely disproportionate share of emissions and pollution. According to Oxfam, they emit as much as the poorest 66% — around five billion people.

And even within that 1%, things get worse. A tiny subset – the top 0.1% – is responsible for a massive share of those emissions again, thanks to private jets, yachts, multiple mansions, and lifestyles so carbon-intensive they should probably come with a health warning for the planet.

In other words, a microscopic number of people are wrecking the climate for everyone else.

Group	Approx % of Global Population	Approx % of Global Emissions
Bottom 99%	~99%	~(~84% total, much of it very low per person)
Top 1%	~1%	~16–17% total emissions (Oxfam International)
Top 0.1% (subset of 1%)	~0.1%	A very large share of that 16% — maybe several % of total emissions just from this tiny slice (per high-emitting daily footprints) (Oxfam International)
Top ultra-rich / Billionaires	<<0.1%	Extremely high emissions share per capita (data vary) (Oxfam America)

What makes this even more obscene is that while countries like the UK are somewhat insulated from the worst impacts of climate breakdown, it’s poorer countries that are already bearing the brunt: floods, fires, crop failures, heatwaves, and displacement. I say “somewhat insulated” deliberately. We’ve already felt the impacts here over the past few years, and they’re accelerating.

If the AMOC (Atlantic Meridional Overturning Circulation) slows down and stops, as recent research warns it might, the UK will experience far colder conditions alongside extreme weather, making food production incredibly difficult. This is not something we should be sitting comfortably about. It could happen within our lifetimes.

So yes, a small percentage of the world’s elite – the super-rich who control the media, politics, economies, and militaries – are conning us. For years they tried to hide it. Corporations shifted responsibility onto individuals: BP invented the personal carbon footprint calculator; airlines peddled dubious offsetting schemes. But now many of the conmen aren’t even pretending anymore, openly lusting for more power and levels of wealth I can’t even comprehend.

Trump openly told us Venezuela is “about the oil”. An increasingly likely conflict with Iran would be too. Greenland? Rare earth minerals. Netanyahu and Trump have both fantasised about turning Gaza into the “Riviera of the Middle East” – built on the blood, bones, and bodies of Palestinians, thousands of them children. It’s immoral. It’s grotesque.

We’re in the middle of a pandemic, but not COVID, Ebola, or anything biological in the usual sense. This one often presents as a middle-aged or elderly white man with obscene wealth and a messiah complex. A tiny clique with so much money and influence they can bend even well-meaning politicians to their will through donations, threats, blackmail, litigation, and lies.

You see it constantly with oil and gas giants. Their lobbyists meet ministers hundreds of times a year – a level of access completely unavailable to ordinary people. And that access isn’t accidental: it’s transactional.

It’s not just oil and gas. It’s billionaire media barons like Murdoch, pulling the public’s strings while extracting enormous political power. No UK government in recent history has been elected without Murdoch’s blessing. It’s arms manufacturers profiting from wars they often help create through political and media influence. And behind it all sit the financiers and investment firms, funding corruption, death, division, and lies – all to keep shareholder payouts flowing and the illusion alive that they’re “on our side”.

They’re not.

Epstein is one of the most flagrant examples of how far this rot goes. How deep does the abuse run? How far does the money trail stretch? Andrew Mountbatten-Windsor has been outed. Peter Mandelson has been exposed for accepting money and handing over state secrets. Elon Musk, Bill Gates, Bill Clinton, Richard Branson, Steve Bannon, Howard Lutnick, Larry Summers, Brett Ratner, Ehud Barak — all appear in the files, with more names emerging all the time.

Epstein’s links to Putin, the Kremlin, and other authoritarian regimes are well documented. And then there’s Trump – already a convicted sex offender – whose Department of Justice has redacted anything remotely incriminating about him. Yet he’s corrupted the US political system to enrich himself while his ~~brown shirts~~ ICE agents round up and deport thousands, or shoot and kill innocent US citizens.

I’m not saying everyone named in the Epstein files is guilty of a crime. Some will be innocent. But there is a common thread: wealth, power, and overwhelmingly white men. And it’s telling that the only person imprisoned for what Epstein enabled is a woman – Ghislaine Maxwell – while powerful men hide behind redactions. Meanwhile, victims’ names and images are dumped online.

This isn’t justice. It’s a parody of it.

The corrupt, immoral patriarchy rules. A small cabal of the super-rich manipulates political, economic, and social systems to maintain power, controlling much of the media and warping public perception via algorithms and social platforms. The introduction of Palantir will make this worse, but that’s a topic for another day.

In the UK we now live in a surveillance state, with increasingly repressive anti-protest laws, restrictions on freedom of speech, and even the right to trial by jury – enshrined in Magna Carta – under threat. Can we really make the changes needed to safeguard liberty, wellbeing, and democracy in the face of climate breakdown, resource wars, economic collapse, and rising fascism and authoritarianism?

I see no hope in the traditional parties. Labour has reneged on promise after promise and looks set to lose badly next time around. The Conservatives have learned nothing and are racing Reform to the far right. Reform, despite its “anti-establishment” cosplay, is stuffed with millionaire MPs who broke the country, most of them ex-Tories, and now want to privatise what remains — including the NHS.

I do feel hope with the Green Party – of which I’m a member and a District Councillor. Membership is growing. Good, honest candidates are winning. Hannah Spencer stands a strong chance in the Gorton and Denton by-election. Parliamentary gains don’t feel impossible anymore. Coalition power doesn’t feel impossible. Nothing does, not with Labour and the Conservatives floundering and Reform slowly being found out.

But will it be enough?

Will it take back power from billionaires, patriarchy, and the men pulling global strings? Will it stop fascism, protect children, dismantle elite abuse networks? I don’t think it will, not on its own. The systems are too entrenched, too corrupt. Any new party entering power risks being absorbed, neutralised, or corrupted by Westminster and the global elite.

These systems aren’t reformable. They’re fundamentally broken.

Which leaves one conclusion.

We need a revolution – preferably a peaceful one, because history shows violent revolutions rarely deliver lasting justice.

Revolution is the only way to make the radical changes required for a survivable, fair, and just future: tackling the climate and nature crises, redistributing wealth, ending wars of greed, dismantling elite impunity and stopping the rise of fascism. You can already see it beginning: resistance campaigns, mutual aid, community organising, people growing food, fixing things, giving time, showing kindness under adversity.

Resistance is alive. But oppression and repression are fighting back, and the sparks of revolution must be fanned – through non-violent direct action, communication, campaigning, and community – if they are to survive and grow into a blaze that not even the billionaires can extinguish 🔥

If you want to see one example, look at https://takebackpower.net/. There are many others. And yes, consider joining the Green Party. We’ll need its people, ideas, and values for whatever comes next.

That’s all for today.

Simple, really.

We just need a revolution. ✊

For some light relief here are two pictures of Budge, the Norwich Cathedral cat who I like to visit, and one of Gideon, who runs my house. Who do you think is the most dignified?

Happy New Year

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Here’s to hoping 2026 is full of more kindness, empathy, and positive change than 2025 ever managed.

Yeah. A likely fucking story. Fuck this shit.

The Labour government in the UK has been a betrayal — yes, even accounting for media bias and the usual right-wing bullshit. With a mandate that large (even if not proportionally representative), they could have done so much better. Instead, we get this hollow, managerial nothingness. So what the hell has happened to Labour? What’s happened to democracy? To the right to protest? To freedom of speech? To simply being a decent human being?

I went for a brief walk around the local church graveyard today, on my way back from the doctors — I’ve succumbed to the traditional Christmas viral cold / bronchitis combo. The gift that keeps on fucking giving.

I love Yew trees (Taxus baccata). The berries are magnificent right now — just don’t eat them. If you do, spit out the kernels very quickly, or you’ll get very sick. Possibly dead. Nature doesn’t fuck about.

There are several Yews around Salhouse Church. I often wonder whether they were there before the main church was built in the 14th century. The site certainly has older origins. Maybe it was sacred long before Christianity turned up — first to the Norse who occupied East Anglia, before them the Saxons, before them the Celts, and before that the people who left those astonishing footprints on the Norfolk coast nearly a million years ago.

Who knows what kind of religion or leadership that hominid family followed. Hopefully not the same patriarchal bullshit we’re still trapped in today.

The Yews got me thinking about rebirth as the year turns. About how they grow — sending out looping branches that strike the ground, take root, and become new trees. That process repeats over centuries, meaning that over thousands of years Yews effectively walk across the landscape, if left alone. They’re said to have walked across from America when the continents were joined. Allegedly that’s where Tolkien got the idea for Ents (thanks, Bushcraft instructor Phil – check out https://www.philbrookelongbows.co.uk/).

That ties neatly to my personal motto: Keep On Keeping On.
Be like a Yew.

We have to keep trying to make things better — not just for younger generations, who are utterly screwed as things stand, but for ourselves too. And for the climate. And for other animals, plants, birds, sea life.

What’s happening to the oceans right now is devastating: coral reefs dying, overfishing continuing, grotesque bycatch, ghost nets trapping, suffocating, killing. It’s heart-breaking.

So yes — we need to fight. Non-violently, but relentlessly. Fight for everything:

Fight the far right and hateful extremism in all its poisonous forms.

Fight the oil and gas companies making obscene profits at the expense of climate stability, nature, and human lives.

Fight corrupt governments and politicians who lie, profiteer, and mostly serve themselves. There are notable exceptions — but our own government, and much of UK politics, seems firmly lodged in the corrupt category rather than the redeemable one.

Fight media companies run by billionaire owners desperate to preserve the status quo and their hoarded wealth — whether social media giants or legacy press — pulling political strings while brainwashing us with consumerist advertising and clickbait bullshit.

Fight the narcissistic, misogynist, arrogant old white men (yes, there are women too, but far fewer) who have clawed their way to the top of the fetid political pile, treating truth, human lives, welfare, and civil rights as expendable commodities — traded for votes or simply discarded as democracy and the right to protest are eroded.

Fight banks and insurance companies that prioritise mega-corporations and polluting industries over ordinary people, worshipping shareholder profit while morality gets flushed down the toilet.

Fight the ultra-rich — the billionaires — who hold more wealth and power than any individual should, often avoiding tax while amplifying extremist views from inside their tiny, self-reinforcing echo chambers.

Fight fascism. It’s rising. The warning signs are everywhere. Thanks to my GCSE history teacher — and many books about the 1920s and 30s — for making that painfully obvious. Books are good.

Fight for those worst off: people suffering under neo-colonialism or living on the front lines of climate breakdown. They are dying because of our emissions, our lifestyles, our privilege, entitlement, arrogance, and ignorance — perpetuated by media propaganda, poor education, and comfortable denial.

Fight for Palestinians still being killed in Gaza, and in the West Bank where illegal settlements continue, aid agencies and journalists are blocked, tents sit on rubble, children starve or freeze to death.

Israel is, right now, acting as a terrorist state — and our government still supports it with arms, intelligence, and foreign policy cover. It is heartening to see so many Jewish people worldwide, including within Israel, opposing these war crimes — and to see young Israelis resisting the draft. Please support the UK hunger strikers.

Fight for the people of Sudan, where genocide continues. And for people everywhere —men, women, children — being injured, raped, displaced, and killed. Men use religion as justification, or don’t bother with excuses at all, to dominate, profit, rape, and murder as climate collapse accelerates and wars over finite resources intensify.

We do have abundant resources: sun, soil, ecosystems — if we care for them. But they don’t generate exponential profit for the already-rich, so they’re ignored. They just allow us to live.

You can’t eat money.
We could eat the super-rich, but it wouldn’t be very nutritious. Or sustainable.

Fight for refugees fleeing war, climate catastrophe, and persecution — much of which we helped create. And if you don’t like refugees coming to the UK, then fight for foreign aid instead of cutting it. Cut aid, increase refugees. It’s not fucking complicated.

Fight those putting up flags to spread hate, lies, and division — marking territory for the far right. They target migrants, refugees, LGBTQ+ people, neurodivergent people, black and brown communities — anyone they can scapegoat instead of confronting those actually responsible. They’re manipulated by toxic media and lying politicians. I do wonder how many of those politicians are sponsored by Russia, the US, or both.

Fight for women’s rights — which after decades of struggle are now sliding backwards. And honestly, given the shit job men have done for the last 2,000+ years, maybe it’s time to let women run the show properly. The Abrahamic religions certainly haven’t covered themselves in glory.

Fight for the homeless, the mentally ill, disabled people abandoned by the state while funding is slashed to build obsolete aircraft carriers and weapons of mass destruction. Fuck that shit.

Fight the cult of eternal economic growth on a finite planet. Fight airport expansion. Fight the destruction of our remaining wild spaces, waterways, and seas. Fight pesticides killing insects, herbicides and fertilisers poisoning the land. Fight unnecessary new roads — we need public transport, not more cars. Fight single-use plastic; it’s just oil-industry brainwashing again. Screw Shell, BP, Exxon, Total, and the rest of them.

There is so much to fight for. So many injustices. How the hell do people just ignore it all?

Fight “the man.”
Stand up for kindness, empathy, community, and solidarity. Grow things. Get soaked in the rain and dance anyway. Play music. Just… play.

We can resist this seemingly inevitable slide toward corporate rule, billionaire oligarchy, and societal collapse—but only if we stand up and take back power.

Resist.

People love to say they wouldn’t have stood by while books were burned, neighbours interrogated, friends dragged off to camps. Well, we’re edging frighteningly close to that shit now. Peaceful protesters in the UK are already being arrested in their homes, surveilled, raided.

Democracy, free speech, and the right to protest are being stripped away across the UK and Europe—and it’s far worse elsewhere, including the US, where armed forces are deployed against citizens by a deranged, orange, wannabe strongman and his boot-licking entourage.

So what am I trying to say?

I dunno. Be like a Yew.

Keep on keeping on.
Relentless.
Sheltering.
Regenerative.
Toxic to immoral, illegitimate power.

Work with your neighbours. Trees always do.

So yeah. Happy New Year. Roll on 2026.

And for fuck’s sake—resist before it’s too late.

Or just have a snooze as it all collpases, like Gideon.

Resist or Be Ruled: The Fight for Freedom in a Fractured World

We Are at Risk

An existential threat looms over us — one that grows stronger every day.

The world is being divided, conquered, and exploited by arrogant men — mostly, though not exclusively, old and white — and by their allies. Trump in America, Netanyahu in Israel, Putin in Russia, Orbán in Hungary, Xi Jinping in China, Lukashenko in Belarus, and Milei in Argentina to name a few. They are supported by political movements rapidly gaining power and influence: Reform in the UK, National Rally (Rassemblement National) in France, and the AfD (Alternative for Germany) in Germany.

The institutions and laws that were created after the Second World War to safeguard peace, democracy, and justice are being eroded, undermined, and dismantled — and they were built for a reason.

The Institutions Under Attack

These include the Council of Europe, of which the UK was a founding member — a leading human rights organisation.
European integration, beginning with the European Economic Community, built prosperity and trust between nations.
NATO, designed as a deterrent to aggression from Russia, China, and North Korea — though critics argue it has also been provocative.
The European Union, founded to promote peace and democracy, from which the UK was misled into withdrawing.

There are also critical human rights protections: the European Convention on Human Rights, the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child, the UN Convention Against Torture, the Human Rights Act, the Equality Act, and the fundamental right to peaceful protest.
Yet these cornerstones of democracy are being chipped away by successive laws restricting free speech and dissent — the very essence of a free society.

The Authoritarian Playbook

The first step for those who seek authoritarianism — and in some cases outright fascism — is clear: dismantle or discredit the institutions that oppose them. Then exploit public anger over poverty and inequality to consolidate power. The irony, of course, is that these same leaders are the ones perpetuating that poverty and inequality. They are taking us for a ride.

Trump appears intent on destabilising Europe and the United Nations, whether by design or through alignment with Putin. Both support Germany’s AfD — a direct threat to European unity and stability. Empowering the AfD is like planting dynamite beneath the foundations of peace and democracy that have protected Europe for decades.

Trump knows exactly what he’s doing. As a narcissist, he believes his actions are justified. In the U.S., he governs by emergency decree, steadily eliminating opposition. ICE agents patrol the streets, spreading fear; the National Guard is deployed to American cities under the guise of quelling “violence.” Trump describes Portland as “war-ravaged” — yet people there post pictures of peaceful parks, open cafés, and calm streets. He claims “It’s anarchy,” though he clearly has no idea what that word means.

Trump has even pardoned far-right rioters convicted of violence during the January 6th insurrection — an armed attempt to overturn a legitimate election. If you’re violent but pro-Trump, it seems that’s acceptable. If you care about honesty, equality, and justice, you’re branded as “woke.”

The enemy doesn't arrive by boat, he arrives by private jet

The Fragility of Freedom

Everything we now take for granted — our freedoms, comfort, and relative stability — could vanish in an instant. Trump is normalising military presence on American streets, perhaps laying the groundwork to declare sweeping emergency powers, suspend elections, or bypass democratic oversight. If not him, then perhaps Vance or another successor will.

Meanwhile, in Europe, governments are suppressing protest, increasing military budgets, and pandering to Trump’s ego. China grows more assertive. Russia, vast and patient, plays the long game. The world risks being carved up by the U.S. and its allies, by China and Russia, while nations in the Global South may only influence outcomes at the margins. Africa, rich in resources, remains exploited by all — Europe, China, Russia, and the U.S.

Over it all looms the climate and biodiversity crises, driving food shortages, violent weather, floods, fires, and mass migration. These may soon eclipse every political crisis — or accelerate our slide into protectionism and authoritarianism.

Choosing Courage Over Fear

The world feels increasingly frightening – and it’s okay to be afraid. What matters is how we respond to that fear.

Do we stay silent as freedom of speech and the right to protest are eroded? As citizens are arrested for demanding an end to genocide, or for calling for urgent action on the climate and nature emergencies?

Or do we stand up? Do we engage in protest and nonviolent resistance, call out hate and lies, and demand that our politicians act? Do we build a more tolerant, inclusive, and equal society — one that dares to reform the systems that no longer serve the people?

Recently, a video surfaced of a lone woman on the Norfolk coast confronting a group erecting nationalist flags. It was a small but courageous act, especially when others have been harassed or attacked for similar resistance. She refused to be a bystander. We all must do the same.

Resistance Begins with Us

We are being manipulated — by politicians, by media, by the ultra-wealthy, and by the far right’s lies and division. Patriarchy and privilege still dominate the stage. We are told what to think, who to blame, and which words are now forbidden. Migrants are scapegoated for problems created by the powerful.

We must rebuild from the ground up — stronger local communities, solidarity, and hope. Stop consuming the propaganda of our supposed leaders. Deploy hope, not hate.

Act now, before we are convinced that 2 + 2 = 5.

Self Propelled

Self propelled adventures through life; blogging on cycling, touring, micro-adventures, general shenanigans, and environmental news